A/N Ahh yes, a new story. To all ye who are new to my account; welcome! To all ye who read The Future Project; I am so, so sorry for not updating for a year… The Future Project is under major renovations right now and I hope it will be returning to your screens in the not so distant future, some of the chapters (especially the very early ones and the latest few) are being rewritten slightly and once I finish that some new ones should appear! Anyway, I hope you enjoy this new story- Amongst the Anarchy:
The wizarding world is under a new Minister. Things have changed. After the murder of George Lockwheeler, the former minister of magic, England was in anarchy. Many believed that death eaters were rising up again. Amongst the panic a new leader arose, one who promised freedom and safety for all, one who promised a world where the unfaithful strived and the faithful thrived, one who promised a better world. The wizarding world was in such a state that they immediately warmed to this new leader and was thrilled when a few years back they read in the Daily Prophet that he was the new Minister of Magic. 'Time for a better world' the papers had read that morning. But how wrong they were, how wrong indeed.
The sharp rain flooded the dirty streets of Diagon Alley. The people sitting on the sides of the road pulled their thin jackets around their head and pushed their money pot further out onto the pavement, in hope that some sympathetic wealthy person might drop a Knut or two into it. But not many of those wealthy people remained now. After the war celebrations were over much had changed, and not for the better.
A man with shocking blond hair knocked on a large wooden door.
"What do you want?" Answered a voice coming from the inside.
"Work. Anything, I'll take anything," Begged the man, "I'll work for very little, please,"
The oak door opened slightly. "Show me your arm," Ordered the voice.
"Sir, plea-"
"I said; show me your arm," Without warning the man behind the door viscously grabbed the blond man's left arm and shoved up his wet sleeve to reveal his forearm, a moment later the arm was forcefully released followed by a loud: "Get out,"
"Sir, please, I beg of you,"
"Get out before I get Bagarre," The man warned. The blond man trembled, Bagarre Fowle was an officer for the new ministry, he was feared by both men and women alike and made it his duty to scare all those below him. He despised beggars and the poor and had absolutely no respect for anyone other than the new minister of magic. Knowing that, his threat sent the other man to silence- he continued, "What is your name?"
There was silence. "Draco Malfoy, sir," The blond man answered at last. There was no reply from the man, but what seemed like a lifetime later the grand oak door opened fully. The man, who was adorning a dirty brown waistcoat and loose-fitting trousers, grinned showing his decaying teeth and mangled tongue.
"Draco Malfoy," The ugly man snickered before taking a puff from his cigar, "I'd give up looking for work if I were you Draco Malfoy, no one around 'ere will 'ave you. Disgrace to our people," The man spat at Draco's feet and slammed the door on his face.
Draco checked the clock that hung above Gringott's bank and sighed; he had ten minutes until his weekly visit to Saint Mungo's hospital. As he walked towards his destination he went through his day in his mind. All his attempts to find work had proved unsuccessful, one look at the God forsaken ink staining his left forearm and all potential employers would curse the ground he stood on then send him on his way, yet everyday he would attempt to find work all the same, that's what he had been doing the whole day, and not much else.
Not long later he found himself in the reception of Saint Mungo's. Like everything else in the wizarding world Saint Mungo's looked well worn out, cream paint was peeling off the walls and dry mould was spreading like fire across the floors and the doors. The employees matched their surroundings, each of them looking like the walking dead with pale, dry skin, chapped lips and dirty hands and hair. Obviously the patients looked even worse. So much had changed in the last two years. Draco walked up the stairs made of rotting wood up to the top floor named; 'The Mental Health Clinic' and walked up to room 273. Without knocking he shook out his wet hair and trudged into the room.
In the middle of the room a sick looking man lay fidgeting with a quill. Beside him sat a healer who was regularly dabbing his head with a cold flannel.
"Son," The man looked up from the bed and stared at his visitor, he tried to muster up enough energy to give a smile but was unsuccessful.
"Don't 'son' me, Lucius," Draco bit back.
"You are my son so I shall call you son," Lucius Malfoy was the image of the mighty fallen, his usually sleek blonde hair was matted with tendrils that plastered his gaunt face whilst the bright silver of his eyes had dulled into a murky grey. The classic condescending expression that had haunted Draco's childhood, however, still adorned the old man's face- seven stints in Azkaban apparently hadn't knocked the arrogance out of the elder Malfoy.
"We may be born of the same blood, yes, but that does not make you my Father," Retorted Draco, "You have disgraced our family, we have had our fortune stripped and our name has been branded forever as untrustworthy. I have to look for jobs on the street every single day, and no one will have me because of you,"
"You make it sound like you're the only one who can't get a job, Draco," Lucius replied calmly, "No one can. The daily prophet has written plenty of articles about it recently- unemployment has risen 30% since last year or something. Everyone is out on the streets looking for jobs, if you're going to blame anyone, blame that good for nothing new minister of magic, take all your problems to him."
"Like he would listen, we both know he won't help us," Draco snapped.
"Why are you here?"
"To pay for this week's medication, like a do every damn week," He responded.
"If you claim to despise me so much, why do you insist on paying for my medication?" Asked Lucius, "Why not let me die?"
Choosing to ignore his Father Draco removed ten galleons from his pocket and gave it to the nurse, stating it was to pay for his potion and vowing to return the next week to pay for the next batch. Few other words were said before Draco left, Lucius had fallen unconscious like he regularly did due to the nature of his illness and for that Draco was thankful as it meant he didn't need to bid his former Father farewell before departing. Draco made it up half way across the corridor before a voice stopped him.
"Wait, Mister Malfoy," Draco turned around to see Lucius' nurse standing in front of him holding quill and some parchment.
"What?" Draco snapped impatiently.
"I needed to ask you a question," She said quietly, slightly intimidated by the dirty looking but obviously muscular man. Draco looked at her and prompted her to go on by sighing loudly and moving his hand in a circular motion. "Okay, well, about your Father," Draco shot her a warning look, "Sorry, I meant Lucius... Well, sometimes when unconscious he says, well he mumbles really,"
"Hurry up nurse women, I haven't got all day,"
"Right, yes, sorry, sure, I'll go on, yes, right, well, Lucius mumbles potion ingredients sometimes when he is unconscious, I have jotted them down and have checked all potion records and no potions include the ingredients he has listed,"
"And your point is?"
"I was wondering if he was listing ingredients to a potion that a member of your family has created but hasn't officially been listed, I really want to find out what this potion is because I think it would aid his recovery. Here is a list of the ingredients he often says,"
Draco took the parchment the nurse was holding out to him and skimmed the list; from first look he didn't recognise the brew. "Why should I waste my valuable time trying to work this out?"
"You don't have to, sir. But if you do find some time, I would greatly appreciate it. Thank you mister Malfoy, I will see you next week."
Back at the house at which Draco asked for a job earlier
"Who was that, Artemellus?" Asked a young women, aged around twenty-seven, wearing a clean white shirt and a tight, knee-length blue skirt. She was drinking a light brown beverage which one could only presume (or hope) was tea.
"Ex-death eater, wanted to work 'ere, told 'im to sod off," chortled the gross man, apparently named Artemellus.
"Anyone who I might know?"
"Draco Malfoy, pretty sure you've 'eard of 'im,"
The girl spat out her tea onto her white shirt and groaned at the mess she'd made before exclaiming: "Draco Malfoy! Begging for work! Holy cricket what has the world come to?"
"The Malfoy family got stripped of all their galleons, left 'em knutless!" Replied Artemellus, who couldn't help but wear a little smug grin as he describe the Malfoy misfortune. "Now they 'ave to find work in this stupid place like the rest of us, only being an ex-death eater makes things a little bit 'arder,"
"At least we have jobs," Sighed the girl.
"Speaking o' money, you owe me this month's rent!"
"I can give it to you tomorrow, I swear, the ministry are making cut backs and my department gets hit the most!" Exclaimed the girl.
"By tomorrow, or you're out on the streets, I gotta make a living too 'ermione!"
"By tomorrow, I swear." She sighed. Hermione Granger had returned to Hogwarts after the war to repeat her final year, as she knew good results would help her get a job in the ministry. After leaving school she was quickly headhunted by Kingsley Shacklebolt and was his apprentice for three and a half years, before he tragically died whilst on a mission. However, following his death, she was offered a job at the ministry as a 'junior Auror' and was quickly promoted to 'experienced Auror' only a year later. Once the new minister came into power her department was drastically reduced, 90% of all Aurors were fired as the new minister believed that they were not needed any longer but a few needed to be kept for purely precautionary reasons; that was the only time Hermione Granger was actually thankful for Rita Skeeter. As for when the minister had gathered the auror department into a small meeting room to tell them who he was firing Hermione noticed a small beetle sitting on top of the table, both the minister and Hermione shared a knowing look as they had both recognised the beetle to be Rita Skeeter in her animagus form, Hermione swore that Rita was the reason the minister did not fire her- there would have been outrage if the public had found out the minister had fired the femme fatale of the golden trio.
Now, two years later here she was, working at an extremely low salary, struggling to get by in the horrific new world the Minister of Magic had created. She had considered going back to the muggle world, but having no muggle qualifications would leave her with no job at all she made the difficult decision of staying put.
But amongst her low wage and dirty, rented room above Artemellus' pub she did have some happiness in her life. Harry and Ginny had married earlier that year and had a child on the way; they were living comfortably in a small wizarding town near Oxford, living off the money the old ministry had given them as a thank you gift after the war. She had been offered the same but gracefully declined it. Ronald was doing less well, but compared to the majority of the people in Magical England he had a rather pleasant life. He had bought a small farm shop in Hogsmeade which kept and sold chickens, he really liked chicken. He would often ask Hermione out to dinner but she was insistent on keeping it as a friendly affair, nothing romantic. Other than those three Hermione had lost contact with everyone else from Hogwarts, occasionally she would receive a letter from Luna, who had moved to Italy, describing her Italian antics but other than that the Hogwarts years were really a thing of the past. Her only other friend was Meredith, a tall girl with dirty blond beach waves and deep green eyes to die for, they had met at work and had immediately clicked; they spent most of their time discussing Jane Austen novels, which suited them just fine. And then there was Artemellus, her landlord, who was a ghastly man with no sense of personal space or personal hygiene. Every night he would bring in the wealthy men of London and get them to try some of his special Firewhiskey (the special bit was that it was 90% vegetable oil that had been used to cook the chips, not that Artemellus would ever admit that to anyone) and when the wealthy men were sufficiently inebriated her would rob them of their treasures and send them out onto the street. Having Artemellus as your landlord did come with some perks, however. If Hermione was having a bad day he would leave a butterbeer outside her room, and sometimes a free butterbeer can turn a bad day into a pretty darn good day. Artemellus Fletcher was alright.
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